The rest is just meh.

2/19/2010 7:50:51 PM

cool thread

2/19/2010 7:53:25 PM

ski jumps and curling you mean

2/19/2010 7:53:57 PM

short track

2/19/2010 8:00:43 PM

Curling a sport? That's like saying Bowling is a sport.

2/19/2010 8:48:47 PM

Curling is the worst "sport" ever

2/19/2010 8:49:32 PM

Curling is the best sport played on ice by attractive women ever.

2/19/2010 8:52:02 PM

I would not consider anything that a woman 5 months pregnant in while in the olympics a sport.

2/19/2010 8:53:42 PM

Except for Ice Fuckin'

[Edited on February 19, 2010 at 8:54 PM. Reason : well I didn't see sawahash's post]

2/19/2010 8:53:55 PM

Ice Fuckin' hasn't been an Olympic sport since the great popsicle incident of 1978.

2/19/2010 8:59:24 PM

OP has obviously not watched snowboard cross

because that shit is AWESOME

2/19/2010 9:04:49 PM

Quote :

"I would not consider anything that a woman 5 months pregnant in while in the olympics a sport."

haha yeah we were talking about last night how a sport where you can wear dangly earrings isn't a real sport.

2/19/2010 9:46:15 PM

Quote :

"haha yeah we were talking about last night how a sport where you can wear dangly earrings isn't a real sport."

O Rly?


[Edited on February 19, 2010 at 9:50 PM. Reason : Oops.]

2/19/2010 9:49:49 PM

Quote :

"I would not consider anything that a woman 5 months pregnant in while in the olympics a sport."

So skeleton isn't a sport? Because in '06 one of the German skeleton athletes was pregnant.

2/19/2010 9:52:30 PM

^ They're freaks so that doesn't count

2/19/2010 9:52:41 PM

Well let me rephrase that then. Skeleton is a sport that you would have to not give a shit about your pregnancy to participate in.

So something that a woman who is 5 months pregnant and doesn't have much risk of losing her pregnancy due to an injury.

2/19/2010 9:56:52 PM

You can lose your pregnancy while you're asleep.

2/19/2010 9:58:23 PM

I heard you can lose your pregnancy by sucking too many cocks

2/19/2010 9:59:41 PM

if only that were true

2/19/2010 10:16:31 PM

i'll be burns

you be allen

2/19/2010 10:17:37 PM

Okay yes you can lose your pregnancy sleeping. BUT riding on a sled on your stomach while youre preggers is just stupid.

2/19/2010 10:17:48 PM

If you're pregnant, I'm willing to help you abort via BJ. I'll volunteer to be guy #1, 3, 6, 9, 12, and 37.

2/19/2010 10:18:36 PM

there are too many kids anyway

2/19/2010 10:22:00 PM

If you dont watch the skiing you're fucking crazy b

2/19/2010 10:47:55 PM

snowboarding


basketball

2/19/2010 10:48:39 PM

Quote :

"This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by International Olympic Committee. "

Fuck you, IOC

2/19/2010 11:02:59 PM

AHAHA

2/19/2010 11:04:18 PM

Curling gone forever soon???

Quote :

"VANCOUVER, British Columbia – Jutting its rounded self from the waters off the west coast of Scotland is Ailsa Craig, an uninhabited 104-acre island that’s home to the only known supply of the granite needed to make a proper curling stone. It’s called blue hone granite – an intensely hard substance that is uniquely suited to slide smooth and true down a 146-foot long sheet of ice, withstand countless crashes into other stones and prevent even trace amounts of moisture to seep into it. That would cause it to pit and thus move unpredictably. Curling stones are made of blue hone granite from Ailsa Craig off the Scotland coast. “This is the best type of granite in the world for this type of purpose,” said Donald Macrae, managing director of Kays of Scotland Curling Stones, which has exclusive rights to the island’s granite. You could say without blue hone granite there is no sport of curling. The Olympics refuse to use anything else. There’s only one problem. “It is not going to last forever,” Macrae said. Yes, one day Kays is going to run out of granite and curling is going to run out of stones. It’s a strange concept, like if the world just ran out of baseballs, ending – or changing – the sport forever. There’s no need to panic or hang up the brooms; the sport isn’t going to end tomorrow, or by the next Olympics. Or even anytime soon after that. When “one day” is, however, no one knows. It could be 20 or 30 years. It could be decades longer. It depends on demand for curling stones, British mining regulations, puffin breeding levels and if technology somehow allows for a non-blue hone granite solution. No one has a specific answer to any of the aforementioned. And while no one is currently all that concerned, this is a sport that dates back to 1511. One day means something. Besides, have you ever heard of another sport where this could ever be possible? “This is only place that we harvest from, but we feel good that it will be a long time before it runs out, especially given the level of demand,” said Macrae, whose company has operated on the mainland, not far from the famed Royal Turnberry golf course, since 1851. “If curling suddenly exploded in popularity and our orders went up dramatically, we would have to take another look at the situation.” Another look may actually be required. This game that resembles shuffleboard on ice is suddenly hot. Since becoming an Olympic sport in 1998, it’s enjoyed a surge in popularity. Television ratings are strong. The 6,000-seat venue here has been packed and rowdy for every session of the Games. On Thursday night, ticket brokers worked the streets outside seeking marked-up prices. According to the World Curling Federation, participation has grown both at the highly competitive and the grassroots levels, especially in Asia. China is competing here for the first time, and the game is gaining prominent television exposure in the world’s most populated nation. “People want to play because they see it on their TVs,” said Joanna Kelly of the WCF. “It’s grown all over the place.” With more growth comes more demand for the stones – hunks of granite cut and polished into a 36-inch circumference disk that weighs between 38 and 44 pounds. Ailsa Craig, an uninhabited island off the coast of Scotland, is the only known place to find blue hone granite. AP Despite centuries of looking, the necessary amount of blue hone granite to make the stones has only been discovered on Ailsa Craig. There’s plenty there, it’s just not all accessible. The island is a closely guarded environmental treasure. In the 1960s, native birds, most notably the puffin that for centuries used the island as a prime breeding ground, disappeared. The British government later decreed it a Site of Special Scientific Interest and concluded that rats, which miners had brought to the island, were eating the bird eggs. In the 1990s, the government stopped all commercial activity and grew poisonous wheat to cull the rats. Birds began returning, including a couple dozen breeding pairs of puffin. Today the island is managed as a bird reserve by the Royal Society for the Protection of the Birds. Kays of Scotland had to work out a special one-day permit in 2001 that allowed it to pull blue hone granite off the island. It wasn’t allowed to quarry or blast the island’s high rock walls. It was merely allowed to scoop as much already displaced blue hone – rocks already lying around – as possible. The company says it gathered 1,500 tons onto a ship that day. There is a debate over how much rock Kays still has. Richard Harding, the curling development officer of the WCF, said Kays’ current supply will last 10 to 20 years, depending on demand. Macrae says Kays’ supply will last “many years.” However, Macrae also acknowledges that with demand up, “we use around 180 tons per year.” At that rate, 1,500 tons would be tapped in just over eight years. The harvest was nine years ago, and even at previous lower usage rates, simple math says the supply is dwindling. Both Kays of Scotland and the WCF say there is plenty of already detached blue hone waiting to be scooped up if another one-day harvest is permitted. That would offer a short-term solution. For the long run, Harding points to new blasting technologies that have less of an environmental impact, although that would require a considerable rewriting of the island’s current conservation statutes. To be sure, the immediate future of curling is not in any known jeopardy. The entire debate is more about intrigue than alarm. Grassroots demand can only grow so fast, since it costs up to $30,000 to outfit an entire team with elite stones. Those have long shelf lives – up to 30 or 40 years, and protective rings have been introduced to extend life beyond that. Meanwhile, a Canadian company produces a curling stone from Welsh granite that is serviceable, although not for elite levels, according to the WCF. Still, the fascinating possibility of a stone shortage looms. The granite can’t last forever, and with each surge in popularity, forever gets a little closer."

[Edited on February 20, 2010 at 12:15 AM. Reason : w]

2/20/2010 12:14:32 AM

tl;dr

2/20/2010 12:19:26 AM

tl;dr

Very interesting, that they dont have a alternative material. I want to call bullshit, but who are we kidding, its curling, like I know a damn thing about it.

2/20/2010 12:26:04 AM

Quote :

"slide smooth and true down a 146-foot long sheet of ice, withstand countless crashes into other stones and prevent even trace amounts of moisture to seep into it"

and someone figured this out in 1511? I mean, it boggles my mind how some people come up with ways to use stuff




[Edited on February 20, 2010 at 12:39 AM. Reason : image]

2/20/2010 12:35:06 AM

its just a bunch of games. hockey is the only event where you actually compete against your opponent. The rest you are compteting against the course.

2/20/2010 12:56:13 AM

^ except curling

and nordic combined

and biathlon pursuit

and short track

and snowboard cross

2/20/2010 1:14:07 AM

this thread summarizes the faves...americans need instant love..

2/20/2010 3:20:39 AM

Yeah guys, the Olympics Games are just a bunch of games. Geez!

2/20/2010 3:43:36 AM

curling is some bs ice billiards. Short track is a legit sport but you are racing against time to have the best time. interrupting your opponent gets you dqed. the other ones you listed don't require athleticism. people competing with babies in their gut torn acls takes away all credibility.

2/20/2010 1:59:22 PM

you're right, there's no athleticism involved in skiing non-stop for six miles with a pack of eight other guys pushing you and another pack chasing you

2/20/2010 2:01:57 PM

don't watch any of it

2/20/2010 2:04:26 PM

skiing is just keeping your balance while going incredibly fast. anybody can go fast but these people have guts and coordination to keep their form while going fast. sure it takes ENORMOUS skill for all these events.

guts? ya athleticism? not so much

these games were invented by mountain people to have thier own olympic events because they aren't very athletic.

2/20/2010 2:41:06 PM

mountain people have the highland games, not the winter olympics.

2/20/2010 7:24:43 PM

mambagrl strikes again

2/20/2010 7:26:12 PM

Quote :

"these games were invented by mountain people to have thier own olympic events because they aren't very athletic."

2/20/2010 7:29:21 PM

i too like these two sports but cannot support the claim in the thread title. i have seen several other sports that were in fact part of the olympics

2/20/2010 7:42:14 PM

All of the sports in the winter games require lots of extremely specialized equpiment. Some of the events mirror with the winter x games and the athletes use potential energy not their own. When you look at the summer games you have little, no, or very simple equipment and competitors use thier own energy.

Lets be real. Areas on earth where you can ski are very limited and how many people really have access to a bobsled and track on a daily basis? Probably not even a thousand. Look how few countries participate.

Then look at the summer olympics. Anyone can run, jump, or fight.

If the summer olympics were equivalent to the winter olympics they would only have floor competition, hockey, archery, cycling, skateboarding and shuffle board.

2/20/2010 8:18:09 PM

don't tell tonya harding this. she'll fuck your shit up!!

2/20/2010 8:20:09 PM

I do wish there were more events that actually had a form of scoring that wasn't done by judges. Are there any besides curling and hockey that aren't races and aren't subjective?

2/20/2010 8:34:51 PM

Quote :

"skiing is just keeping your balance while going incredibly fast. anybody can go fast"

So then why aren't you out there winning gold medals?

2/20/2010 8:44:34 PM

op is correct

2/20/2010 8:59:22 PM

Quote :

"Lets be real."

That's a good idea.

2/20/2010 9:21:20 PM

Quote :

"So then why aren't you out there winning gold medals? "

1. If you read my post I said it takes enormous skill which I don't have
2. I'm not daring enough to risk my life obtaining that skill. (lets face it, winter games are dangerous)
3. If I was daring enough, I would've never had enough access to slopes all my life to compete with the mountain people.

These aren't global sports. They are only available in isolated areas.

2/20/2010 11:43:30 PM